


Stay Here Where You Are Happy

by Crabbadon



Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Angst, Animal Death, Cooking, Domestic, Food, Gift Fic, Implied Nudity, M/M, Nightmares, One Shot, Sharing a Bed, Talking, Trauma, Violence, accidental nudity
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-08
Updated: 2017-06-08
Packaged: 2018-11-11 06:47:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,224
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11143062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crabbadon/pseuds/Crabbadon
Summary: Thorin's guilt and fear lead him to push Bilbo away, but can he take it back?





	Stay Here Where You Are Happy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [yubiwamonogatari](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yubiwamonogatari/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Azhâr](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4063402) by [yubiwamonogatari](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yubiwamonogatari/pseuds/yubiwamonogatari). 



> So this is an Azhâr fanfic and also a monumentally late birthday present for Yubiwamonogatari; it barely qualifies as Hobbit fanfiction because I literally haven't read that in over a decade or seen most of the films. So in order to understand it, you have to know that in this version, Thorin is restored by the Arkenstone but has weird dreams and lingering trauma.  
> There's very very tangential romantic content; it's much more about the two characters having an argument and then resolving it, processing trauma and interpersonal relationships while living with poor mental health, as well as a couple of utterly gratuitously inserted tropes as pure pure Yubi-service.  
> The stuff about Bilbo being a crack shot and all the names are from canon.  
> Anyway I just hope you enjoy it and uh that's all I have to say about it!

The summer sun was beginning to set as the knot of visitors and villagers began to disperse, each going their separate ways, the hobbits fussing mercilessly over their unexpected guests. Bilbo himself had the honour of hosting Thorin II Oakenshield, the King under the Mountain, at Bag End, and they walked in that direction with the mild tension of two companions who, upon finding themselves for once entirely alone, did not quite know what to do with themselves. After a few attempts at polite conversation, they lapsed into a companionable silence, enjoying the hues of the setting sun through the leaves.

All of a sudden, Bilbo stopped and crouched low, signalling for silence. Thorin followed his lead, put his hand on his hilt, felt his heart pound as he cast around for what could be following them. Assassins? Or could it be some dark spirit, drawn to the light of the arkenstone, hanging from a chain upon his breast? Unable to see anything other than a few fat pheasants waddling through the brush, he waited, stock still, as Bilbo crept forwards.

Creeping close to the ground, Bilbo stretched out a hand to a heavy, rounded bit of flint kicked up by the side of the road, seized it, and drew it across his body like a discus-thrower. In an instant, one of the birds keeled over, the stone spinning off into the brush, the motion driving the other birds to take wing as Bilbo leaped forwards and wrung its neck before slinging it over his shoulder.

“Well! There was a bit of luck. I’d not given a moment’s thought to luncheon, and here it came straight to us! I daresay your company cleaned me out, and anything perishable –” He stopped, staring at his companion, who was still crouching, stiff and pale. “Thorin? Are you alright? I hope I didn’t startle you.”

Thorin was struggling with himself, torn between the lingering panic from expecting an attack, berating himself for making a scene, and trying not to cause alarm. He was barely taking in what the hobbit was saying, the words drowned out by the his own voice chastising his nerves from inside his head. Suddenly, he stood, his head swimming, his fingers numb, and began to walk again. “We should go,” he heard himself say, “It will be getting dark soon.”

The physical motion helped to clear his head, and he began to notice with some embarrassment the solicitous look which Bilbo was giving him. “If I had known you were such a crack shot, I would have fetched you a sling instead of that dagger,” he offered, forcing a casual tone.

“Oh, well!” Bilbo flapped his hand as if brushing the compliment away. “I don’t recall fighting ever so many pheasants on the way to Erebor! Don’t you hunt, Thorin?”, he asked, taking the bait.

“We have done,” he admitted, “Though more often with traps than with bows. And I doubt there is one of us who could stun a pheasant with a stone from the wrist.”

Bilbo beamed with unconcealed pride, appearing to have forgotten all about Thorin’s strange turn earlier, and launched into a meandering anecdote about hunting with Sigismond as a youth, which Thorin, thankfully, didn’t seem required to contribute to. Before the anecdote was done, they were at his front door.

“Well, here we are, just as I left it! I dare say you would have been more comfortable with Fortinbras, but it was kind of you not to impose while young Ferumbras is so awfully under the weather.”

“I have told you once already, there is no finer hobbit to be the guest of than Bilbo of Bag End.”

Bilbo stepped inside the door, beginning to pull the dust-covers off of the furniture, suddenly house-proud. “You may say that if you like, but there’s certainly finer places to be a guest of! I’m sure you’ll find it terribly cramped, and I certainly haven’t had time to dust –”

“It’s a fine home,” Thorin reassured him with a smile, finding that Bilbo’s nerves and fuss endeared him to him.

“Yes, well, you’re fortunate there’s a house to come back to at all, the way you all whisked me away! But Adalgrim’s been ever so kind in making sure the house and garden were kept while we were on our trip; I shall have to have a gift-basket made up for the gardener, I suppose. Goodness, what a lot to do now that I’m back in the Shire!”

Watching Bilbo busying himself with his hobbit-hole, Thorin felt a pang of something that had been building since they returned to the Shire. Bilbo seemed so happy here, so confident and self-assured, that Thorin began wondering, not for the first time, if he had been right to recruit him. He began to doubt that it would be fair to drag him back to the Lonely Mountain after just a few weeks at home. His chest tightened as he watched Bilbo, happily lost in the task of setting the house to rights, his hands and feet knowing just where to find everything in the house. When Bilbo laid his hands on his pipeweed tin and crowed with delight, Thorin broke into a sweat. He saw him plummeting from the ramparts of Erebor, broken on the ground; he saw him speared on Orcrist’s tip, the gory visions despoiling the wholesome scene before him. How long could he keep himself away from that evil? Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, but what then?

Bilbo caught his gaze and frowned. “Is something the matter, Thorin?”

Thorin hesitated, momentarily silent, unable to meet Bilbo’s gaze. “I’ve decided to have Fíli take over your duties at the Lonely Mountain,” he said, impulsively. “He’s recovering well, and ought to begin getting to grips with the numbers.” He was hardly certain what he was saying, but it felt right; Bilbo should get away: away from him, away from Erebor altogether. He would be happier here. He belonged here. “You shall stay here when the retinue moves on.”

Bilbo looked at him, mouth open like a fly-trap, frozen in the act of plumping a cushion. Thorin looked away, fighting to preserve his resolve, to steel himself against selfishly changing his mind. “It’s been a long journey,” he added, sounding hard and clipped. “I should like to rest.”

“Well, I… Well, then. I’ll show you to your room, I suppose.”

Silence hung thick in the air, turning sour as Bilbo made the bed, speaking only with his hands, fairly slamming the pillows onto the goosedown mattress. When it was done, he left in the same hurry, with a curt nod and a final “Well, then.” Thorin’s guts twisted as he lay down to sleep, restless in the creaking bed, fearful of what dreams may come under the bright, low moon shining like a gem in the window. He would have the rest of Bilbo’s share sent when trade began again, he told himself; he would task Dáin with finding some sinecure or honour to award him. Bilbo would come to see that his was the right choice, the selfless choice, in good time. None of these thoughts settled the guilt which pricked him, keeping him tossing and turning on the edge of sleep.

He awoke with a start, having slipped shallowly into a nightmare where it was he who was falling, plummeting from the face of Erebor, Arkenstone flying from his grip. His soul returned to his body with the thud that came from such a dream, making the struts bow; just as his heartbeat began to slow, he fell again, this time with the struts snapping and falling clean from the bedframe, dropping the mattress and letting it split on the ground. While he was still spitting out feathers, trying to process the shock, Bilbo came rushing in in his nightgown with a candle, shouting with surprise at the sight. “Oh! Oh, Thorin, the blasted woodworm! I’d clean forgotten that frame had wanted fixing, you must have had a fright!” He gripped Thorin’s forearm to help him to his feet, then turned away sharply the moment that Thorin cleared the feathery cloud, revealing that sometime in the night the breeches which Thorin had gone to bed in had fallen victim to the summer heat. Thorin tugged them on, embarrassed, adding his tunic as well to cover the scar in his chest. Bilbo peeked over his shoulder, turning around fully when he saw that Thorin was dressed again. “Well, I suppose there’s only one thing for it,” he declared, ushering Thorin out of the dusty room, “You shall take the master bedroom, and I suppose I’ll just make do in the armchair.” Despite the gracious offer, the clipped politeness had slid back into his voice now that the initial shock was past, and Thorin’s heart sank.

He protested. “Bilbo Baggins, you can hardly expect me to turn you out of your bed in your own house! I am certain your armchair shall serve me just as well.”

“I suppose it shall, provided you don’t expect to wake up having the same shape with which you went to sleep. Now, kindly retire so I can finally get some rest!”

The argument continued for several exchanges, Thorin’s guilt and Bilbo’s anger over the decision to leave him behind conspiring to fuel the petty squabble until Bilbo declared, “Well if you insist on having me in that bed, you’d better not mind my snoring!”

All at once the tension broke, and the two slumped to the floor, laughing and exhausted from their journey and from the lateness of the hour. “I put up with it from here to Erebor; I am certain I can survive another night of it. If you are sure it is wide enough for the two of us, then I think we could both use a night in a real bed.”

The two of them climbed into the wide feather bed, tensions momentarily forgotten. A scant few seconds later, Thorin discovered that sleeping side-by-side on roll mats on a cold night under the stars was a very different proposition to sleeping side-by-side in a feather bed in the warm, close space of a hobbit-hole. He lay stock-still on his back with his arms at his sides, acutely aware of where Bilbo’s body brushed against his, of his body heat, of his breathing. It wasn’t until Bilbo began to snore that the crackling fireplace lulled him to sleep, drifting into dreams of home.

After what seemed like only moments, he awoke to Bilbo’s voice calling him from the doorway, and to daylight streaming onto his face through the round window above the bed.

“You’ve missed breakfast,” Bilbo told him, “and second breakfast too, but I dug around the garden while you were asleep, so there’s carrots and parsnips roasting with the pheasant for luncheon. I would have woken you earlier, but I wanted to spare you my unwanted counsel.” Before Thorin could respond, Bilbo had spun on his heel, apron-strings flicking out of sight. Thorin pulled on his tunic and sat up in bed for a few minutes, trying to gather the courage to follow.

It failed him. There he sat, listening to the clattering of pots and dishes from the kitchen, the noise helping to wipe his mind clear of thoughts, staring stupefied at the open doorway. After however long it might have been, Bilbo reappeared in the doorway, angrily drying a plate at him. “Will Thorin Oakenshield the second, King under the Mountain, be joining the common folk at the table? Or is it breakfast in bed for his Majesty?”

“I do not want you to stay here!”, someone roared at the top of their lungs, “I. Do. Not. Want. You. To. Stay. Here.”, that person repeated, and Thorin realised it was him. A ball of acid was burning in his chest; his throat was raw and his head was beginning to pound.

Bilbo took a moment to respond, but when he spoke his voice wavered only a little. “Please do not shout at me. I won’t be shouted at, not even by you.”

Thorin answered raggedly through numb lips, suddenly exhausted. “I know. I apologise.”

Bilbo’s tone softened a little. “If you don’t want me to stay here, then why tell me to, Thorin?”

“I… It is not safe at the Lonely Mountain. Not while I am there. I am not safe. I just proved that, did I not?”

Bilbo took several deep breaths before answering, and Thorin saw him make a gesture of frustration through unfocused eyes. “Thorin, I… You can’t exile me just because you think you’re, you’re cursed or mad or something of that ilk.”

Thorin shrugged, energy already spent. “I nearly killed you once before. Who’s to say –”

“And nevertheless, here I stand. Thorin, your guilt will do far more harm than your greed did if you allow it to rule you.”

Thorin looked down at his hands in silence.

“So am I still welcome at the Lonely Mountain?”

“Of course. Always.”

“Well, then.” Bilbo stood in silence for a while, staring at his dishcloth before continuing, “That’s that.” He backed out of the room. “You just… I’ll keep the pheasant warm for whenever you feel ready.” Thorin nodded gratefully, and Bilbo left, shutting the door behind him.


End file.
